I’ve been sporadically following the Hathi Trust Fair Use and digitization brouhaha, and it leaves me wondering if and/or how it will affect equal Accessibility for those with print disabilities re: the cultural record.

Digitization to me means an increase in access because once digitized, the information can more easily be consumed in a usable format. Do you think there will be ramifications that will hamper universal access in the future? For example, will institutions that have the funding to do a similar project now be reluctant to try and digitize the totality of the human experience for fear of being sued? Or will the attempt be made, but the legal hoops needing to be jumped through might make the project take an interminable amount of time?

We forget, of course, ... and that's part of the reason we have search tools--to help us find and recover what we've forgotten. I don't know about you, but I'm constantly re-searching for things I only vaguely remember, and I need all the help I can get. This week's Challenge comes in three parts. First, a question of something I […]

Hate 404 errors? I do. If you do active online research (which is pretty much the whole point of SearchResearch), you fairly often run into web pages that are 404. When this happens, it means that the link you're trying to follow leads to a page that is missing. It might have been removed by the author, or just moved elsewhere. In any case, the link […]

As you recall, ...our SearchResearch Challenge this week was to figure out the history behind this funny group of houses that extends from Lyon Street into the Presidio. Here are the 6 houses that have somehow pushed the boundary of the Presidio a bit to the west.How did this tiny enclave come to be? (My edits of a Google Maps image.) 1. What's the s […]